25 Budget-Friendly Cleaning Hacks

From time-honored, environmentally conscious natural cleaning options and recipes to “you can do what with WHAT?” swaps, these clever tidying-up tips will make your home sparkle with pantry staples and items you probably already own.

March 04, 2021

By: Lauren Oster

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Mix Up Rosemary-Lemon All-Purpose Spray

Antiseptic, disinfectant and non-toxic, this delicious-smelling, three-ingredient cleaner is safe and effective for many kitchen and bathroom surfaces, appliances, glass, carpet and no-wax floors. How’s that for items you usually find in cocktails? (Okay, you don’t usually find white vinegar in cocktails, but you get our drift.)

Make Your Own Cleaning Wipes

The next (and last) time you shell out for store-bought wipes, hang on to the plastic canister and refill it with make-at-home replacements that cost a fraction of what you’ll pay for their manufactured counterparts, and reduce plastic waste. Bonus: You can customize the canister and the wipes with wrapping paper and essential oils of your choice, respectively.

Clean Cutting Boards With Lemon and Salt

When a recipe calls for just half a lemon, put the remainder to work as an all-natural cleaning agent. Dip that second half in coarse salt, then scrub your wooden or plastic cutting board: The crystals remove stuck-on bits, while the acidic juice brightens and freshens the board’s surface. Once you’ve scrubbed, let the board sit for about 20 minutes, then rinse and condition with mineral oil.

Polish Metals With Ketchup

Yup, you heard us right: It’s time to put that orphaned packet in your junk drawer to work. Grimy brass, copper and silver are no match for ketchup’s acidic tomato and vinegar. Rub the condiment on with a cloth, let it sit for 10 minutes (timed, if you please, since you don’t want to damage your metal pieces), then rinse and buff back to a cheery shine.

Unclog a Slow Drain With Baking Soda and Vinegar

This old-school duo is so legit that even the folks at Liquid-Plumr salute its ability to clear clogs. If your sink isn’t clearing as quickly as it could, pour a cup of baking soda down the drain, then follow it with a cup of heated vinegar. Wait about 10 minutes, then flush the drain with a pot of boiling water.

Mop Vinyl Floors With Apple Cider Vinegar

Skip costly commercial vinyl floor cleaners and mix up your own solution by adding 1 cup of apple cider vinegar to a gallon of water. Dirt is no match for the vinegar’s acidity — and it’ll remove that dirt without leaving a soapy film behind (please try harder, soap).

Shine Hardwood Floors With Tea Bags

Save a small fortune on store-bought wood-cleaning products, in turn, by brewing your own with a few spare tea bags. Let them steep in a kettle’s worth of boiling water for a few minutes, then transfer your tea to a bucket and let it cool a bit. Dampen (don’t soak) and wring out a soft cloth, then wash your floor and prepare to be impressed by the fabulous shine the tea’s tannins leave behind.

Brighten Linens With Lemon Juice

Harness the one-two punch of citrus and sunlight to bleach your whites without harsh chemicals. Add half a cup of lemon juice to your washing machine’s rinse cycle, then use a clothesline in the yard to dry your wash in the open air.

Clean Windows With a Potato...

Spuds are considered healthy carbs, and for those in the know, they’re also considered a surprisingly effective natural glass cleaner. Now, hear us out: Slice a potato in half, rub it on the surface of your window until the pane is covered with a starchy film, then spritz that film with water and rub it clean with a towel.

...Or Newspaper

If you’d rather hang on to your potatoes for culinary purposes (alas, you can’t eat potatoes after using them on your windows), try replacing paper towels with old newspapers in your window-washing regimen. Paired with window cleaner, they’ve got a well-earned reputation as streak-free wipers (thanks to their absorbency and the fact that they don’t leave fibers behind).

Remove Condensation Rings With Toothpaste

If you’ve got non-gel toothpaste, you can quickly and easily remove all (physical) evidence of that one guest who never, ever manages to use one of your coasters before plunking their drink down on the furniture. Just apply paste to the offending ring, then rub gently till the stain is lifted. (If the stain is extra-stubborn, you can mix the paste with a bit of baking soda for added abrasion.) Wipe the paste away with a clean, damp cloth, then dry.

Whip Up Homemade Laundry Pods

With little more than a bar of Castile soap, a few household staples and an old ice tray, you can make your days of purchasing laundry pods (and the plastic packaging that accompanies them) a thing of the past. No need to be a mad scientist to get this DIY right; the toughest step is grating the soap.

Dust Ceiling Fan Blades With a Pillow Case

Don’t consign holey old pillow cases to the great sleepover in the sky; instead, use them to remove hard-to-reach gunk from dirty fan blades. Just cover each blade with a clean case, pinch it together to make contact with the blade’s top and bottom surfaces, then carefully pull the case off of the blade.

Turn Old Sweaters Into Dryer Balls

Cut down on drying time and bid farewell to chemical-laden softener sheets by turning an old wool sweater into eco-friendly dryer balls. This DIY is two upcycles in one, as it happens: It also makes use of unwearable old stockings.

Clean and Condition Wood With Olive Oil

Meet your new favorite three-ingredient cleaner: Funnel distilled water, olive oil and white vinegar into a spray bottle, shake it up, and you’ve got an all-natural way to scrub up your home’s wood surfaces. To boost the cleaner’s scent, add lemon essential oil.

Create "Cleaning Slime" With Borax and School Glue

Why do you need cleaning slime? Because hard-to-reach gunk like crumbs between chair rungs and (let’s be honest) laptop keys isn’t going to stick to other cleaning products of its own volition. Also, slime is weirdly satisfying.

Make Citrus Beeswax Furniture Polish

If you’ve got a chunk of beeswax from a candle that stubbornly refused to burn evenly, we’ve got just the DIY for you. This microwave-based project yields a tin of all-natural polish that’ll freshen up your furniture for months.

Use Shaving Cream on Patio Furniture

If unexpected beard cultivation has rendered your household’s shaving product supply unnecessary, might we suggest repurposing it on your outdoor furniture? It’s a nontoxic solvent and cleaner that’s perfect for freshening up plastic patio pieces.

Lift Dirt From Leather With Vinegar

A 50/50 white vinegar and water mixture will gently remove gunk from leather furniture — just be sure to test it on an inconspicuous patch first to be sure you’re not causing damage or discoloration. Dip a microfiber cloth in the mixture, then rub in a circular motion to lift the dirt away.

Scrub Painted Walls With Dish Detergent

Maintain satin and semi-gloss paint surfaces by combining 1/4 cup dishwashing detergent with a gallon of warm water, then use a natural sponge and plain white cleaning cloths to wash your walls, rinsing the sponge in a bucket of plain warm water between uses.

From: Emily Fazio

Coax Mildew and Mold Out of Grout With Peroxide and Soda

Create a paste with one part hydrogen peroxide and two parts washing soda (that is, sodium bicarbonate that’s not intended for consumption) and use a ready-for-retirement toothbrush to apply it to grout between the tiles in your shower.

Remove Small Grout Stains With a Pencil Eraser

If you’re looking to do away with a single small stain on the surface of your bathroom grout, you can try folding sandpaper into a crease and working it back and forth along the grout line. You might have better luck (and will certainly feel like more of a household magician) attempting the same trick with a humble pink pencil eraser.

Steam Your Sofa With an Iron

While it’s undeniably satisfying to delegate the work of cleaning upholstery to someone else, we would argue that it’s even more satisfying to accomplish a small job on your own and spend the money you’ve saved on snacks. Thus, if you happen to have a couch with fabric that can tolerate water-based cleaners, you should try putting your iron on its “steam” setting, then waving it back and forth across your couch to loosen up dirt and stains.

Clean Rugs With Snow

Apply a bit of natural TLC to clean a high-pile or delicate rug by unrolling it upside-down on fresh, clean snow, then “beating” it firmly with a “paddle” like the head of a dry mop. Flip it over and dislodge more dust and crumbs on the other side, then move it to new patches of snow and repeat until the snow beneath the rug appears clean. (Psst: Scandinavians have used a similar trick for hundreds of years to gently clean wool sweaters.)

From: Emily Fazio

Freeze Garbage Disposal Cubes

While we’re speaking of effective chilly tactics, consider freezing chunks of lemon in white vinegar to create cubes that will tackle stuck-on food and smells in your garbage disposal.

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